


The Death of the Peanuts

by fanficfriends



Series: Happy Birthday [10]
Category: Blaseball (Video Game), Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Charleston Shoe Thieves, Chorby and gunther are only implied btw, First Dates, First Love, First Meetings, Houston Spies (Blaseball Team), Internalized Homophobia, Knives, M/M, Murder, Play: Julius Caeser, Self Insert OC - Freeform, but he knows what hes doing, but how concious can he really be of it hes 16 here, he does talk about top gun this is very important to the story and also to tillman's character tyvm, im not gonna tell you who but they are there :), the shelled one is also a human in this, tillman is homophobic in the tillman way, where he is very concious of it but he is also not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:22:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28207524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fanficfriends/pseuds/fanficfriends
Summary: As Tillman eats lunch alone in the cafeteria, a stranger approaches him with an outrageous plan.
Relationships: Tillman Henderson/Luke Castellan
Series: Happy Birthday [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2066082
Kudos: 1





	The Death of the Peanuts

Tillman didn’t care that all the other Shoe Thieves were sitting at a table together in the cafeteria and he was alone. He didn’t care that he had to eat his cold hotdog by himself like a total loser while his so-called team was sharing a huge plate of nachos and laughing. Where had they even gotten nachos? Who the fuck served nachos? Could penguins even eat nachos? The caf always served terrible food and then you only had like fifteen minutes to eat it before you had to get

Anyway, his hot dog was definitely better and cooler than their nachos. He bet they wished they had a hot dog instead of nachos. It didn’t matter if his new team didn’t want to be friends with him. Next year he would graduate and be off to Baltimore college anyway with his old, COOLER, team. Yeah. And the thieves would be stuck here in this terrible high school ruled by the terrible principle who sometimes randomly killed students.

Looking very intently at his hotdog and definitely not at the Shoe Thief table, Tillman heard someone slide in across from him at his table. Ugh.

“Listen, I don’t have fifty bucks, alright? Come talk to me next week.”

“Fifty bucks?”

Confused, Tillman looked up. Across from him was a student he vaguely recognized- tall, blonde, big scar across his face- a Spy, maybe? A Wing?

“If I don’t owe you fifty bucks, why are you here?”

The SpyWing leaned in across the table and lowered his voice. “What do you think of the principal?”

Tillman blinked. “You a narc?”

“No, I promise. I’m Luke. I got this in the finals last fall-“ he gestured to his face, “-and a bunch of my friends were killed. You’re Tillman, right? Shoe Thief? I know he killed your friend. Combs. I thought you might want to do something about it. If not, that’s cool. We can just, you know, talk. I don’t think we’ve met before.”

Tillman did remember Luke, or at least hearing about him. He used to be the star batter for the Spies, until they made it to finals last fall and the principal killed three of them in a game against the Crabs. Luke had gotten hurt defending a teammate. His batting average went way down after that. Tillman had felt kinda bad, but not that bad, because they had won the game.

Tillman took another bite of his hotdog. “I’m not a Shoe Thief,” he said, mouth full. “I’m a Crab.”

“The Crabs graduated.”

Tillman scowled. “Once a crab, always a crab.”

“Hey, fair enough,” said Luke. He spread his hands wide in a peacemaking gesture. “I get it. You’re always the most attached to your first team. I’m sorry about that. It must be hard.”

Tillman blinked. No one had ever considered what it must be like for him, having the Crabs ascend. It was all “Poor Shoe Thieves, having to have Tillman,” and no, “Poor Tillman, all alone on the Shoe Thieves.”

He looked over at their table again. Now the penguin was…bodysurfing?

Luke followed his gaze, and his expression softened. “Screw ‘em. They don’t deserve you, if they don’t want you.”

Tillman took a moment before responding, in a very masculine manner because men take their time to talk, and definitely not because he was getting a bit choked up. “What were you planning to do? About the principal.”

Luke met his gaze, blue orbs staring into brown. “Kill him.”

“He’s a human just like the rest of us, I mean, as far as we know. What gives him the right to go around setting people on fire?”

Tillman paused. Yeah. Yeah! What did give the principal the right to just set people on fire?

But also, killing people would definitely get you in a lot of trouble. And Tillman wasn’t sure he was into that.

“I don’t know,” said Tillman. “I mean, not because I’m afraid. I’m definitely not afraid. I’m really brave. And six foot one. But it’s just that…killing someone sounds really time-consuming? And I’m really busy, like I’m so close to finally winning Fortnite.” Yeah. Yeah. That sounded good.

Luke looked more disappointed than Tillman expected. “Oh, ok. I’ll see you around, then?” He slid out of the seat.

Wait. “You’re leaving?”

“I mean, I can stay if you want.” Luke sat back down. “I just have other people to talk to, if you can’t help.”

“I don’t care if you stay,” said Tillman. Luke looked sad when he said this, and Tillman didn’t care what Luke thought of him, but he rushed to get his next words out anyway. “But I’ll help you. I changed my mind. I realized…uh…I’ve already won Fortnite. I forgot.”

Luke’s face lit up, and Tillman felt like maybe the risk of expulsion was worth it just for that. “Great! Thank you so much!”

“So,” said Tillman, very suave and chill-like. “Is it just us?”

“No,” said Luke. “I thought it would be better to spread out the blame. I have a bunch of people. Metellus and Casca and Trebonius Cimber—”

That made sense, and definitely wasn’t disappointing. “Cool. That’s chill. Are they all Spies?”

“That’s classified.” Luke winked.

Tillman sometimes told people that he carried a knife to school, just to sound cool, but he had never actually brought a knife to school before. He had put it in the waistband of his boxers, because that’s what Tom Cruise does in _Top Gun,_ but it was really uncomfortable and kept digging into his leg. (Tillman really enjoyed Tom Cruise. He thought it was cool that a short guy did so much action-hero stuff. Not that Tillman was short, because he wasn’t. He was super tall. But he could stand in solidarity with short people. Yeah.)

Anyway, the knife was making him really nervous. But it was fine. He approached the secretary’s office and knocked on the door, really hard and manly-like.

“Come in!” someone said.

The secretary smiled at him as he walked in. “Are you also here to see Mr. Peanut?”

Tillman nodded.

“He’s very popular today, you’ll have to get in line behind those boys.”

Already sitting in the office was Luke, and a group of students Tillman didn’t know. Luke gave Tillman a smile that definitely didn’t make his insides flutter because he wasn’t gay.

Tillman lowered his voice. “Yeah, I’m here to ask about—” what had his excuse been, “—there’s a frog in my parking spot? And I can’t park, because I don’t want to hit it. Yeah.”

The secretary was looking at him quizzically, as was Luke. Tillman’s cheeks heated.

“Well that would be a problem for the custodian,” said the secretary. “I can get him, though I really think you could just chase it away yourself.”

“No!” said Tillman too loudly. “It’s the principal’s pet frog.”

“He has a pet frog?”

“Yes. He’s my family friend. I’ve met his frog before. Many times. He definitely has one.”

“Oh, alright then,” said the secretary, frowning concernedly. “You better go in first, then.”

Crap. Not what he wanted. Tillman stalked back to the waiting chairs.

“Hogging all the action for yourself?” Luke whispered in his ear, teasingly, and he was not going to react to that.

Tillman sat on the chair, and he wasn’t scared, he wasn’t, but he couldn’t keep his hands from shaking. Luke noticed—oh no, Luke noticed, and took his hand, pressing it tightly to still it.

It was the feeling of Luke’s hand in his that he kept in his mind when the principal paged him in, it was Luke’s smile that steadied his arm as he raised his dagger, and it was Luke’s voice in his ear that muffled the sound of the principal’s last breaths.


End file.
